The game company "Interplay" was assassinated through corporate espionage, and predatory theft of its IP "Fallout"

The writers at Interplay knew their source material, crafting stories that were cohesive, brimming with excellent humor and hidden truths about society and its downfall—truths that most people at the time couldn’t fully grasp.

The dynamics of society today are eerily similar to the worlds depicted in Interplay’s Fallout 1 and Fallout 2. The world is running low on resources, countries are beginning to fight over resource-heavy and strategically critical locations, heavy tariffs are impacting trade with the East, and U.S.-Canada relations are under strain. Wars are breaking out across the globe, viral experiments are becoming more common, robotics and AI are advancing rapidly, and people are increasingly clinging to nostalgia—all while hidden political agendas lurk beneath the surface.

Personally, I believe Interplay was silenced because they were exposing uncomfortable truths under the guise of a video game, and someone took notice. Then, boom—in comes Hervé Caen, sending a great company with a bright future into the proverbial meat grinder. His actions forced Interplay to sacrifice their masterpiece IP to a company that would not only water it down significantly but also strip away all the world-building that encouraged players to think critically about the world beyond the game.

That’s what the original Fallout games did—they made you think. They made you realize there’s something far darker going on in society than what meets the eye. The writers and developers at Interplay were freedom fighters and artists to their core. They were telling truths for gamers to heed carefully, and they should never be forgotten.

These games weren’t just RPGs—they were philosophical treatises disguised as entertainment, dripping with allegory and filled with biting critiques of humanity's hubris, greed, and inability to learn from history. Every vault experiment, faction power struggle, and ironic billboard about "progress" reflected a deeper truth about the real world, as though Interplay had reached through the veil of fiction to tap us on the shoulder and whisper, "Pay attention."

The parallels between the world they built and the one we live in now are unsettling. Resource scarcity driving conflict, geopolitical tensions mounting, unchecked corporate influence, and the reliance on rapidly advancing (and poorly understood) technology—these themes aren’t just relics of Fallout's narrative; they are harbingers of the present day. Interplay's stories weren’t just speculative—they were warnings wrapped in humor, grit, and tragedy.

Great art often threatens power because it dares to expose inconvenient truths, and Interplay’s vision of a fractured, post-apocalyptic future was far more reflective of reality than most people were ready to admit. Herve Caen's role in dismantling the company and diluting the IP only reinforces the sense that Interplay's voice was too loud, too daring, and ultimately too dangerous to endure.

The tragedy of Bethesda's takeover isn’t just the watering down of mechanics or the shift to a different kind of storytelling—it’s the erasure of the intellectual weight and societal introspection that defined the originals. The world-building of Fallout 1 and 2 wasn’t about spoon-feeding players a narrative but about making them wrestle with uncomfortable truths: the cost of survival, the fragility of morality, and the cyclical nature of human folly. Bethesda's version, while visually impressive and accessible, often leans toward spectacle over substance, reducing the franchise’s once-searing commentary into a backdrop for action.

Interplay showed us a mirror and dared us to look beyond the reflection, to question the systems and beliefs we take for granted. Their work should be remembered not just as a hallmark of gaming but as a testament to the power of storytelling as a tool for resistance and revelation.